Charity Group Lags in Efforts On Gulf Homes

By LESLIE EATON and STEPHANIE STROM

Published: February 22, 2007

CORRECTION APPENDED

In the two years following the 2004 tsunami in the Indian Ocean, Habitat for Humanity International, the nondenominational Christian ministry, built or repaired 8,500 houses in Indonesia, Thailand, India and Sri Lanka.

Habitat for Humanity seemed poised to do the same thing along the Gulf Coast after Hurricane Katrina hit in 2005. Just days after the storm, its chief executive appeared on CNN, promising to build and repair as many homes as it could pay for, ''hopefully in the thousands.'' The organization quickly mustered 50,000 volunteers, raised $127 million, and attracted prominent backers like President Bush and the New Orleans jazz luminaries Harry Connick Jr. and Branford Marsalis.

But almost 18 months after storms destroyed more than 250,000 homes, Habitat for Humanity says it has built just 10 houses for poor hurricane victims here, 36 in New Orleans, and a total of 416 along the entire coast, from Alabama to Texas. More are under construction, for a total of 702.

That slower pace reflects, in part, the more complex houses that Habitat builds in the United States, as well as the mind-numbing issues -- involving insurance costs and government regulations -- that seem to have bogged down efforts to rebuild after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

But Habitat International is starting to face criticism that its procedures are slow, rigid and perhaps unsuited to helping disaster victims, however rewarding its efforts are for its volunteers. The organization is working through its independent local affiliates, which function like franchises and which have tended to build a dozen houses a year each.

''I don't think they were prepared to undertake the massive rebuilding efforts required after Katrina,'' Fred Carl Jr., who was the Hurricane Katrina housing coordinator for Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi, wrote in an e-mail message.

''I think they're very good at building a few homes through their local chapters,'' Mr. Carl continued, ''but this was a whole new ballgame and I think they may have underestimated the vast challenge this involved.''

This criticism is echoed by some leaders of charitable and housing groups who are reluctant to be quoted because they work with Habitat. Some suggest that Habitat's insistence on working through affiliates has slowed it. The group has spent $61.5 million of the $127 million it raised for the Gulf Coast. Nearly three dozen of the houses it has built were paid for by other charities.

Even within the organization, some have questioned its continued emphasis on building from scratch, rather than on helping people repair and rebuild damaged houses.

Habitat for Humanity officials say they hit the ground running after the storms and are pleased with the pace of building. The group says it will meet its goal of 1,000 houses under construction or completed by the end of August, the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, and it plans to build 1,000 more.

Along the Gulf Coast, ''we had built 57 homes a year, now we're building 57 a month,'' said Kenneth J. Meinert, a volunteer who left his job running a building company in Canada to coordinate Habitat for Humanity's storm response. ''In these conditions, to have built 700 homes, it's an absolute work of God,'' he added.

Habitat, with more than $1 billion in annual revenues, is based in Atlanta and Americus, Ga., and has operations worldwide. Its mission often seems as much about providing spiritual fulfillment to its volunteers as it is about improving new homeowners' lives.

''Habitat really taps into this American ethos, this real barn-raising sensibility,'' said Jerome P. Baggett, a professor at the Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley, who has written a book on the group. ''But building many houses is more complex than building the occasional barn.''

Traditionally, Habitat volunteers raise money and use donated materials to build $60,000 houses in their own communities. In the region today, most of the volunteers come from ''away,'' as Mr. Meinert put it, and the group has used some factory-built modular houses.

In an interview here, Mr. Meinert said that about 400 of the 700 houses were what the group calls House in a Box projects, framed outside the Gulf Coast by volunteers and then trucked south for assembly.

Habitat for Humanity lent volunteers to house-gutting groups, he said, and has given some of its money to other organizations working on the Gulf Coast, including $3 million to help finance home repairs.

So far, Mr. Meinert said, of the $61.5 million spent, about $15 million has gone to Louisiana affiliates and $15 million to those in Mississippi.

Critics have questioned Habitat's continued emphasis on building new homes rather than on rehabilitation. They note that other groups have done more with this approach: volunteers from Southern Baptist churches mucked out 12,000 houses in Mississippi alone, and have rebuilt or repaired 3,000, while volunteers from Mennonite congregations have repaired hundreds of houses and built 31 new ones last year. Even the small Southern Mutual Help Association, a nonprofit that reported revenues of $3.3 million in 2005, has helped rehabilitate or rebuild more than 500.

Correction: February 23, 2007, Friday
Because of an editing error, a front-page article yesterday about the slow pace of home building by Habitat for Humanity in areas hit by Hurricane Katrina referred incorrectly in some copies to the Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley, where Jerome P. Baggett, who wrote a book about Habitat, is a professor. It is an independent institution; it is not part of the University of California.

Correction: February 28, 2007, Wednesday
A front-page article on Thursday about the slow pace of home building by Habitat for Humanity in areas hit by Hurricane Katrina carried an outdated reference to Kenneth J. Meinert, who is coordinating Habitat's storm response. He is a senior vice president of Habitat for Humanity International, no longer a volunteer.